Business Casual: Conservatives find an anchor in institutions

As I have listened to the two political conventions playing in the background at work and home, I had an epiphany.

Before I lay it on you, let me preface that many, if not most, business owners lean to the right politically.

Being the co-owner of a restaurant, I explored this dynamic in an earlier column about how conservatism may appeal to entrepreneurs because of a practical preference for simplicity over complexity.

With the Democratic and Republican conventions commandeering the past two weeks of news, I realized another possible reason for business owners' politics.

It's about how they view institutions.

In a nutshell, business owners often see institutions as central in life at least in part because they lead a commercial enterprise.

Someone who runs a business can become so engrossed in the venture that it becomes an all-engrossing institution in the owner's life.

This institution has good and bad days, achieves some goals and falls short in others, all the while surfing on economic and societal waves that can be exciting or scary.

While making plans and on-the-spot decisions, entrepreneurs always have one overriding goal: Keep the business alive.

So as business owners turn their gaze to other parts of life, they continue to see and focus on institutions.

When it comes to politics, who talks most about the institution of marriage? Conservatives.

The institution of family? Conservatives.

And the church. Who invokes this institution most in politics? Conservatives.

If you view America as an institution, then you probably are conservative.

Tradition - which conservatives are more likely to care about - is wrapped up in these institutions.

That may explain the conservative affection for the military. Troops, tanks and fighter jets protect institutions.

Many conservatives also advocate gun ownership and some have even amassed private arsenals that they likely - and hopefully - will never use other than for target practice. They own guns in case they have to protect institutions like a business or family.

By contrast, liberals focus more on the ideas and principles that institutions were created to support.

For example, marriage is about love, caring and stability. Church is about spirituality and community.

Liberals do not focus as much on the military and gun rights because ideas and principles cannot be protected with bombs or firearms.

The "flower power" movement of the '60s embodied this perspective. It's about peace and love.

The idea lives on in the contemporary bumper stickers that read "Commit random acts of kindness."

The conservative response during the '60s and today: God and country.

So much of the often hostile political rhetoric that divides Americans boils down to how we view our relationship with institutions.